January 2010.  Road test - again!

A strange title you may think, so let me explain what has happened since Rosy passed its MOT last April.  I had arranged to have all of the tonneau's and hood, side screens, carpets, etc to be fitted by a Redditch firm that had been recommended to me.

I set out from home on the appointed day to set off for Redditch, the car was running beautifully and as the direct route was via the M42 I thought a nice gentle run would help sort out any 'gremlins'.  I had got on to the motorway and after a short time there was a 'ping' from somewhere under my feet, what I thought was that?  I remembered that I had not stripped down the prop shaft universal joints to check the bearings, I had attempted to strip it down but could not undo the circlips.  This proved to be my undoing, one of the circlips that I had dislodged had 'sprung' out and the front universal joint on the prop shaft was coming apart.  I found this by peering into the hole in the top of the transmission tunnel, however it lasted until I got to Redditch and a garage there sorted it out.

After the car was picked up after the 'initial' fit of the tonneau's, etc another, more serious problem manifested itself.  A sudden crunch and whirring noise came from the transmission, the car was still driving OK but in all of the gears the whirring noise persisted.  On confirming my worst fears, it had to be a problem in the gearbox , so I put the car over the pit and proceeded to drain the oil out of the gearbox. On doing so a clue as to what might have happened became apparent, with the oil came a bolt and washer, a broken tooth off a helical gear and a badly mangled nut.  At some time in the rebuild a nut and bolt must have dropped into the box when the remote cover was off.  The nut had unscrewed off the bolt and got picked up by the rotating gears with catastrophic effect, needless to say I felt a little sick!

It gets worse, I keep my spare MPJG engine unit in the pit and to work on my cars I have to use the pulley block to lift it out, this is not usually a problem as I put it on the back of the bench out of the way, with the sling around it attached to the crane.  However to support the engine whilst removing the rear engine supports this safety feature was taken away.  When I had repaired the gearbox and refitted it I had removed the sling and hook to use on the repair, as I had got used to pulling myself up and down out of the pit, I had not bothered to re-attach the sling.  Anyone that is conversant with these engines will know they sit nicely on the sump and with a block of wood under the gearbox the engine is quite stable.  However it is very unstable without it and when I reached up to put my hand to grab the vice handle to lower myself down, I did not look what I was grabbing, I had put my hand on the gearbox of the spare engine, as I did so it tilted and rolled off the bench!  It crushed my steel cantilever toolbox and followed me into the pit, however there it jammed, between me and the side of the pit.  Fortunately I could just reach the chains of the block and tackle and drag the crane to me, I put the tip of the hook into the hole in the clutch release arm and lifted the engine off me.  I climbed out of the pit, stamped my foot and said damn or words to that effect and thought that hurt.  The net result was I had broken my shoulder blade in two places and badly dislocated the shoulder.  You will be pleased to know that the damage to the engine was superficial, nothing too serious (had it have fallen on to my head it might have been more seriously damaged)

Needless to say that after the disappointment of the transmission problems and the workmanship so far of the hood, etc and having to obtain spares for the gearbox this and the despondency you get when things go wrong it has slowed up work on Rosy.

However it is the start of a New Year and my shoulder has now been operated on and after two months or so I may be allowed to finish the repair get the hood, etc sorted out and I may have it in a fit state to take it back to its former owner to show how Rosy has been revived.